


Learn ye well, fair maidens

by psychomachia



Category: Knightfall (TV 2017)
Genre: B- Parenting, Fluff and Angst, Kid Fic, M/M, Medieval Upbringings, Parenting on the run from an evil organization, Raising a Child in Times of War/Conflict/Danger
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-06
Updated: 2019-09-06
Packaged: 2020-10-11 08:40:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,938
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20543276
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/psychomachia/pseuds/psychomachia
Summary: Landry and Talus really need to learn the concept of family. Eve is there to teach them.





	Learn ye well, fair maidens

**Author's Note:**

  * For [yujacheong](https://archiveofourown.org/users/yujacheong/gifts).

They'll never find her up here, Eve thinks. They may pat her on the head and put things up high where she can't reach them, but now she's taller than them and better at hiding and they're just stupid men who don't know any better.

She's kicking her feet back and forth on the tree branch, when a crab apple goes flying past her head. She ducks, and looks down. It's Uncle Talus.

He doesn't like to be called that, but he is father's brother and that makes him family.

“I am not coming down,” she calls out as he hobbles over to the tree. He hurt his leg the last time they had to run and keeps losing his cane. Father says he does it on purpose and Uncle Talus tells him his mouth is more sensible when it is closed.

“I did not think so,” he says. “You know, it is quite simple to tell that you are Landry's daughter. You both run off without thinking of anyone left behind and get yourself into trouble that I will have to rescue you from.”

“I am not in trouble,” she says. “I can climb down from here.”

He lifts his eyebrows. “Can you?”

She's not entirely sure about that but she's not going to confess any weakness in front of him. There's something about Uncle Talus that makes her want to impress him, to show she's not a weak girl, but a fighter, just like her father.

“It doesn't matter,” she says. “He doesn't care if I'm up here, so I'll just stay here.” She wedges herself more firmly on the branch. Eve thinks she hears Uncle Talus mutter something under his breath, but he's always very careful to not curse around her. Father gets mad when he does.

“Eve, you know that's not true.”

“Then why does he want to send me away?” She asks, and she knows she's been crying and it's so stupid that Uncle Talus can probably tell. “I don't want to go to the sisters.”

“He--” Uncle Talus stops and sighs. “He may have a turnip for a brain, but his heart is in the right place. He fears for you, worries that our strength won't be enough to keep you from harm.”

Eve shakes her head. “Father is the one that always tells me to trust in the Lord and that he guides us all. Does he not believe in that?”

“Your father has always struggled with his faith. And with protecting those he loves.” Uncle Talus looks small for a second, and she wonders just what secrets they still keep from her.

“But I have faith in him,” she says. “So he should have faith in himself.”

Uncle Talus crooks a smile. “I suppose so.”

“So can you convince him not to send me away?” Eve's voice comes out shakier than she wanted. “I don't want to leave.”

“I think you've already done it,” Talus says. Then he looks behind him. “Landry, I didn't think it was possible to find something you were even worse at than obeying rules, but being a pisspoor spy is right there.”

Eve cranes her neck. The bushes rustle. Then her father's head pops out, followed by the rest of him. Even at this distance, she can see his red face as he tries to look away from Uncle Talus, who is glaring. “I didn't want to interrupt. “ He looks away after saying it.

She thinks Uncle Talus might be about to insult her father, since he's fairly fond of doing it, but instead he says, “I think this is settled. You don't want her to leave, she doesn't want to leave, and I want the two of you to stop pretending the world is about to fall.”

Her father walks over to Uncle Talus, puts a hand on his shoulder. “What would we do without you to keep us from being stupid?”

“I can't save you from that,” her uncle retorts.

Eve finds herself laughing and her father joins in. Uncle Talus scowls a little, but he's smiling too. The branch trembles slightly and both of the men look up at it.

“Will you come down now?” Her father opens his arms wide. “I will catch you.”

She steadies herself, then lets go, falling into her father's arms. He stumbles back a step, but Uncle Talus is there at his back before he can go any further, bracing him with surprising strength.

It's as it should be.

* * *

Eve calls him her uncle, but she knows that she has always had two fathers. She had a mother, too, but her Father tells Eve that she went to Heaven. Uncle Talus always looks off when he talks about her, so Eve thinks that there's more to this story, but she won't know it for some time.

She has one father by blood, and another one that came to them covered in blood. It is her first memory of him, though Father says he was there even when she was a baby, looking after the two of them, helping them to safety. This time, it was Father keeping him safe, cleaning and bandaging his wounds and making the same kind of noises he made when Eve first fell on a loose stone, running from an enemy that her father didn't ever want her to see.

Uncle Talus slept for three days and when he woke on the third, her father hugged her, hugged him,and then fell to the floor where he then slept for the rest of the day. “Fool,” Uncle Talus said, but even back then, Eve could see his eyes staring at him fondly.

He stayed with them for a week, the three of them sharing the tiny cottage with the leaky roof, until one day Eve woke up and Uncle Talus was gone. Her father just smiled, a little one that didn't feel true, and said, “It wouldn't be right to force him to stay.”

She didn't ask about why he left, or why her father spent the next month quiet and sad, softly reciting psalms and sighing.

But then they were on the run, again, and everything was forgotten as her father held her tight to him, hiding in the bushes, waiting for the men that would find them and try to take either of them away. He was sick, she knew, a fever that started in his eyes and shaking hands, and spread so that he burned against her.

“Father,” she whispered. “Please rest.”

There were footsteps closer to them. Her father's breath came out in short pants, tired from running and from the sickness that left him shaking and weak. 

He closed his eyes and then he opened them, kissed her forehead. “Run,” he said. “Run until you find one of our sisters or brothers. There are still good people out there.”

“No,” because she didn't know what else to say.

Her father set her down, moved his hand to his sword. “I love you.” 

Eve looked around for a branch, a rock, something to throw at them, because it was her father and she couldn't let this happen, couldn't lose him, please, someone, help them...

"We've found you, Landry," one of the voices mocked. It was loud and angry and Eve put her hands over her ears and kept praying.

Please. God. Please. 

And there was a voice that was louder and it roared at them, like an animal out of one of those bestiaries she once saw. The men fell before them, and then it was Uncle Talus in front of them, covered in blood again, though not his this time.

“Landry, it seems you cannot be left alone.”

Her father rose, unsteady and wavering. He took a step forward, fell against Uncle Talus, who held him, stopped him from crumbling to the ground.

“Talus,” he said. And then her father kissed him on the lips, before slumping against him in a dead faint.

Eve looked at Uncle Talus, still holding him.”Does this mean you're staying?” she asked.

He sighed, beckoned her close and she came to him, gripping her father's leg in one hand while she took Uncle Talus's hand in the other.

“Yes,” he said.

And when her father awoke to see the two of them at his side, the smile on his face was the widest Eve had ever seen it.

* * *

Eve's sitting at the table when her father comes in. She can see he doesn't see her right away, taking a moment to look around the room furtively.

“Are you going somewhere, father?” she asks. He jumps.

“Eve,” he says. “I thought you were asleep.”

“I woke up early. I wanted to practice my tinctures. I think I've almost perfected it,” she says. “Please tell me.”

“Eve--” he begins.

“Please?” She sees his resistance crumble as she pushes the cup towards him.

He wrinkles his nose. “What is this one for?”

“Strength,” she says. “Good health and vigor, according to Letholdus.”

Father stares at it dubiously. “Letholdus?”

Eve nods happily. “I promise it's not going to make you sick,” she says. He drinks it, then almost spits it out.

She amends her words. “It might be a little bitter, though. I think that's the dandelion.”

Father shakes his head. “Very well,” he says. His eyes shift around the room. “Have you seen your uncle?”

“Uncle Talus? I believe he left some time ago.”

Father curses under his breath and Eve almost smiles. Not quite, though. “That fool,” he says in a louder mutter.

“Was he not supposed to leave?” Eve asks. “Were you hoping that he would stay with me while you ran off and did something foolish instead?”

Father blinks. Eve looks at him calmly.

“I was going to leave you a letter,” Father says weakly, as he sits down. “Both of you. You have to understand that all I want to do is protect you.”

“And this time, you were going to leave instead of me.” Eve wants to yell, but she's almost a lady now, Father says, and ladies don't yell. But daughters of stupid fathers do, and so she yells, “How is that better?”

“It isn't.” Father reaches his hand out, takes her smaller one in his. “But there are things I've done and now there are people coming after us. After you.”

“My brother?” Eve asks.

“Perhaps,” Father says. “But I cannot be sure and I need you to be safe. Please--” He stops, sways a little.

“That's what Uncle Talus said, too,” Eve says. “He told me he loved both of us and needed to make sure you didn't run off and get yourself nearly killed again.”

“Eve?”

“He actually made it out the door. I had to change the tincture slightly, make it stronger.”

Father is struggling to get up, but Eve knows it's only a few seconds before he'll go to sleep. “I don't--”

“Hush, Father,” Eve says. “When you and Uncle Talus wake, we'll talk about people running off and leaving their family behind. But you need to rest.”

His head drops to the table with a thunk. Eve winces slightly, then sighs. She walks over to the door of their small cottage and opens it.

Uncle Talus is still outside, snoring away into the pile of leaves.

She picks up his leg, reconsiders, then takes his arms instead.

If all men are this stupid, Eve thinks, maybe she should have become a sister after all.

“Honestly,” Eve says to the sleeping bodies. “You two are fortunate to have me to look after you.”


End file.
